Essence (Nectar 3)

“Yeah, that’s it,” Sasha nodded. “He told them to make him a picture of something. I think he was just trying to occupy them while he was doing something else, Katya and Lyle were being given workups in other exam rooms, but this was the start of other tests for Kyle and Kyla beyond blood workups because she made a grid design of a blue eye, Kyle has blue eyes, and he made one of her green eye. They were the exact same shape and size. Neither of them had peeked at what the other was doing, either. Kyle was focused but Kyla kept giggling, like she had a secret. Kyle looked so focused on his task; it was fascinating to watch this thing unfold. They had such a deep connection. Dr. Constantin was pretty certain Kyla could read Kyle’s mind and copied his design but with his eye colour instead of hers. That’s why I reached out to Sam a few times once I knew he had his eye on her for you. I’d hoped that she’d be able to pull him out of this coma. I sat with them during that same visit and he drew a horse, a stick figure on the Lite Brite, and told me that it was for his sister. That he wanted to give her a horse because she wanted one desperately. He would give her anything, everything. I packed those toys up to go home with them.”

“No idea why he’s in this coma?”

“Nope. Dr. Constantin played with him, with his chemistry, with his psyche. He must have played too much. Treated Kyle like a guinea pig. I don’t even know what caused this because by the time this happened, I had recently become vampire and I was in the midst of my crash and burn phase instead of being in the lab. I wasn’t paying attention until it was too late. I couldn’t access Dr. Constantin’s notes. I tried. But I couldn’t so I couldn’t figure out what he did.”

Sam scratched his head, “I, uh, might be able to help with that.”

“How?”

“Liam Donavan was a computer guru. He’d done a bunch of hacking to breach The Constantin Center’s firewall. I found a backpack in the woods near the cottage where he’d parachuted in and it had his computer in it. I stashed it. Maybe he’s got tools on there or information on there that’ll help. He’d been downloading video and other internal files. We should get that info before Adrian gets woken so you can have a looksee.”

“I’d really like to see if anything in there is useful, either for Kyle or for our cause. I also wanted to ask you about the dagger you brought,” Sasha looked to Tristan, “I want to examine it, try to isolate the substance it’s made with. Our efforts could be considerably more successful with a tool such as that.”

Tristan didn’t bother stating he could get the information out of Adrian easily, just by staring into the asshole’s eyes and forcing him to spill his guts. He wasn’t pleased right now to find out Sam had been withholding that information.

“I’m going to have to say, Sasha, that I’ll reserve making a decision on that until later,” Tristan replied, “Let’s see how things go. Sam, shut your fucking mouth about potentially classified information. And we’ll soon be having a chat so you can share what else you haven’t told me.”

Sam looked contrite.

“Understood,” Sasha said and she didn’t seem too dejected, “I know that once your immediate concern, Kyla, is no longer of concern of this nature we’ll have an opportunity to talk more, talk about what’s next. At this time, we’re in a coalition together to help the Kelly twins. And even if we part ways, you have my word that I will do what I can to keep things peaceful with us, with others who are involved.”

Tristan nodded, “Have you heard from this elder? Can you tell me who he is?”

“I’d rather not say at this moment, in case it conflicts with things down the road, should we find ourselves on opposite teams but no, I haven’t heard from him. I’ve worked all but two hours when I napped through the night on these samples, though, and I think it’s time to taper her off the sedative and see how she’s doing. I’m not liking what I see with her stats on screen. We may not want to wait. I don’t know how long it’ll take to get that reply. Why don’t we get coffee and breakfast and then we can get started?”

Tristan knew he could get information out of Sasha, too. But for now, he’d reserve judgement on all of it. With some of what she’d known about Kyla and about him, he suspected there were double agents either within Kovac or councils he participated on.